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Microsoft began to talk about Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 today, though the company wasn't yet ready to announce a beta or release timeline for the service pack. Rumors pegged SP1 beta for arrival this month . For Windows Server 2008 R2, the company revealed two new features that directly affect Microsoft's desktop virtualization platform. Microsoft Dynamic Memory is an ...

According to a company spokesman, Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) will primarily contain \\\"minor updates,\\\" including patches and hotfixes that will have been delivered earlier via the Windows Update service, rather than new features. One of the latter: an updated Remote Desktop client designed to work with RemoteFX, the new remote-access platform set to debut in SP1 for Windows Server 2008 R2.

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* Updates, including patches and hotfixes that will have been delivered earlier via the Windows Update service

RemoteFX is the latest addition to Microsoft’s desktop virtualization stack. Using this new feature in Windows Server 2008 R2, you’ll be able to deliver an even richer and more user-transparent desktop virtualization experience. RemoteFX functions independently of any graphics stack and supports any screen content, including rich content like Silverlight or Flash. Because it uses virtualized graphics resources, RemoteFX works on a wide array of target devices, which means you can deploy it over both thick and thin client hosts and a wide variety of network configurations.

Server 2008 R2 will be updated to include a feature dubbed 'Dynamic Memory,' which lets IT staff adjust guest virtual machines' memory on the fly:

* Dynamic memory is an enhancement to Hyper-V in R2 and allows IT administrators to pool all the memory available on a physical host and dynamically distribute it to virtual machines running on that host as necessary. That means based on changes in workload, your VMs will be able to receive new memory allocations without a service interruption. For a deeper look at Dynamic Memory check here.

Staff MemberPremium SupporterMicrosoft MVP

Today during our online Desktop Virtualization Hour event, we’ll be talking a little bit about Service Pack 1 (SP1) for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. For Windows Server 2008 R2, SP1 will be introducing two new desktop virtualization features: Microsoft RemoteFX and Dynamic Memory. These features are designed to meet the increasing needs of our customers as they utilize virtualization in their environments with Windows Server 2008 R2. You can read more about RemoteFX and Dynamic Memory on the Windows Server Division WebLog. For Windows 7, SP1 includes only minor updates, among which are previous updates that are already delivered through Windows Update. SP1 for Windows 7 will, however, deliver an updated Remote Desktop client that takes advantage of RemoteFX introduced in the server-side with SP1 for Windows Server 2008 R2.

Windows 7 is ready for commercial deployments now and many industry experts have recommended that customers do not wait for SP1. Many organizations are already in the process of deploying and are receiving benefits from their Windows 7 deployment. You can read some of those customer stories, as well as Forrester’s view of the benefits of Windows 7, with the following case studies:

So don’t wait - go ahead and deploy… you know you want to! ;-) We’re not yet announcing a beta or release timeline for SP1 for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 today. Once SP1 for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 is released, the service pack will be delivered through Windows Update and be available on Microsoft Download Center for download as well. I’ll be posting more on SP1 for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 once we get close to a release milestone. And remember, our Desktop Virtualization Hour online event starts at 9am PST today. Tune in if you want to hear more about desktop virtualization!

Staff MemberPremium Supporter

The one thing that struck me was the fact that Windows 7 will only get some minor updates and bug fixes from the Service Pack. Even though Windows 7 is sweet and looks very good from the beginning, I think there still are a few rough edges in the OS to work on. I was really hoping that Microsoft did some work to add some more sweetness to Windows 7. But I'm afraid that we have to wait a little bit longer. Here is my shortlist of issues to be fixed or better said features to be finished and enhanced in an upcoming update of the OS.

The leaked information on Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Build 7600.20588 that surfaced at the end of last week confirms the first service pack for the latest iteration of the Windows client is advancing in the development process, even though Microsoft is not yet ready to breathe a single word on the progress it’s making with SP1. Reports indicate that Microsoft is gearing up to release a demo version of Windows 7 SP1 to a select pool of testers in the coming weeks. The leaked screenshots of the preview demo build of Windows 7 SP1 certainly validates claims of the Redmond company kicking off external testing of the first service pack for Windows Vista’s successor.

However, it seems that testers and partners close to Microsoft have been receiving preview build of Windows 7 SP1 since the end of 2009. Wzor noted the past year that work on Windows 7 SP1 had begun as early as September 2009. Still, at that time SP1 was only in the very early stages of development, having evolved past the Readiness Milestone in early September 2009. It was in October of the past year that Microsoft started producing preliminary releases of Windows 7 SP1, Builds 7656.0. - 7664.0.

It appears that Microsoft sent various assemblies of pre-Escrow Beta Windows 7 SP1 to partners both in November and December 2009, while also putting together a build quality assurance monitoring development dubbed Beta Schedule Checkpoint. Wzor also claims that, as of January 2010, Microsoft has taken Windows 7 SP1 past pre-Escrow and is now focusing on the fully-fledged Escrow for Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Beta. Reports note that the company will wrap up the Escrow version of Windows 7 Beta in March 2010, no later than the third week. Microsoft partners will be the first to get Windows 7 SP1 Beta Escrow releases in the first half of April 2010.

For Windows 7, SP1 includes only minor updates, among which are previous updates that are already delivered through Windows Update. SP1 for Windows 7 will, however, deliver an updated Remote Desktop client that takes advantage of RemoteFX introduced in the server-side with SP1 for Windows Server 2008 R2.

A number of readers have asked me this week why I've not touched on the recent leak of an early build of Windows 7 Service Pack 1. It's a fair question. I know that Microsoft plans to add little in the way of interesting functional updates in 7 SP1 (whereas the server version is a far different story). But that's no excuse. So I downloaded the leaked build and am installing it now on a physical PC. I'll do a VM-based install as well and take some screenshots.

And there is some documentation that accompanies this build (6.1.7601.16537), which was made on March 27, 2070 and can be considered a pre-beta version. It notes:

Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 will include previously released updates. The impact of SP1 on the Windows 7 client operating systemis considered to be minimal. Included changes are expected to address minor usability issues in specific scenarios. While Microsoftalways recommends that users deploy the latest service pack as quickly as possible in order to maintain the best levels of support, security and user experience, we are strongly recommending to customers and partners that deployment of SP1 should not be considered a blocking issue for the adoption of Windows 7. In other words, organizations do not need to wait for SP1 to begin receiving the value of Windows 7 today as we don’t anticipate the SP1 for Windows 7 to be substantial.

Changes specific to Windows 7

Additional support for communication with third-party federation services

Additional support has been added to allow Windows 7 clients to effectively communicate with third-party identity federation services (those supporting the WS-Federation passive profile protocol). This change enhances platform interoperability, and improves the ability to communicate identity and authentication information between organizations.

Improved HDMI audio device performance

A small percentage of users have reported issues in which the connection between a computer running Windows 7 an HDMI audio device is lost after a system reboot. Updates have been incorporated into SP1 to ensure that connections between Windows 7 computers and HDMI audio devices are consistently maintained.

Corrected behavior when printing mixed-orientation XPS documents

Prior to the release of SP1, some customers have reported difficulty when printing mixed-orientation XPS documents (documents containing pages in both portrait and landscape orientation) using the XPS Viewer, resulting in all pages being printed entirely in either portrait or landscape mode. This issue has been addressed in SP1, allowing users to correctly print mixed-orientation documents using the XPS Viewer.

Changes common to both client and server platforms

More efficient power consumption

SP1 introduces functionality that enables user-mode use of the invariant Time Stamp Counter (TSC). When utilized by applicationworkloads such as SQL Server, the invariant-TSC provides a high resolution multimedia timer (necessary for functionality such as OLTP, data warehouse processing, and so on) at far greater power efficiency than previously available alternatives.

Change to behavior of "Restore previous folders at logon" functionality

SP1 changes the behavior of the “Restore previous folders at logon” function available in the Folder Options Explorer dialog. Prior to SP1, previous folders would be restored in a cascaded position based on the location of the most recently active folder. SP1 changes that behavior so that all folders are restored to their previous position.

Enhanced support for additional identities in RRAS and IPsec Support for additional identification types has been added to the Identification field in the IKEv2 authentication protocol. This allows for a variety of additional forms of identification (such as E-mail ID or Certificate Subject) to be used when performing authentication using the IKEv2 protocol. ​

I had the SP1 (v153) downloaded on this PC before I had to do a factory reset It was very stable, and installation took maybe 15 minutes. Two things I did notice about it:- winver expiration timer: 3/31/2010, so anyone that has it better hope they roll out the final version by then, but I don't think that will be a problem - Shutdown: Seemed faster, and right before the PC powered off, the wonderful little spinning aero cursor would freeze for ~1 second.. which I liked for some reason

Anyways.. Like I said, it was very stable, but unless you're a tester guru such as myself, wait for public beta's or the final release.

I installed on my 64 bit today too and had no problem except the download. Probably server overload. Is it me or do some things seem to load faster? I think I read something about memory usage being tweaked in SP1. Joe